The subject matter herein relates generally to electrical connectors having electrical contacts that sustain wear during a mating operation with another electrical connector.
Electrical connectors are used to transmit data and/or power in various industries. The electrical connectors are often configured to repeatedly engage and disengage complementary electrical connectors. The process of mating the electrical connectors may be referred to as a mating operation. Each mating operation may cause a small amount of wear to the electrical connectors. For example, in a backplane communication system, a backplane circuit board has a header connector that is configured to mate with a receptacle connector. The receptacle connector is typically mounted to a daughter card. The header connector includes an array of electrical contacts (hereinafter referred to as “header contacts”), and the receptacle connector includes a complementary array of electrical contacts (hereinafter referred to as “receptacle contacts”). During the mating operation, the receptacle contacts mechanically engage and slide along the corresponding header contacts. The sliding engagement between the receptacle and header contacts may be referred to as wiping, because each receptacle contact wipes along an exterior surface of the corresponding header contact. Friction generated during the wiping may cause mechanical wear to the header contact. For instance, adhesion between the receptacle contact and the corresponding header contact may remove surface materials of the corresponding header contact as the receptacle contact wipes along the header contact. Mechanical wear reduces the lifetime operability of the header contacts and/or header connector.
For at least some known backplane communication systems, each header contact is a single projection, such as a post or pin, and each receptacle contact may have a pair of contact fingers. The contact fingers have mating interfaces that face each other with a contact-receiving gap therebetween. During the mating operation, the header contact is received within the contact-receiving gap. The mating interfaces of the receptacle contact engage opposite sides of the header contact and are deflected away from each other.
When the contact fingers are in deflected condition, each of the contact fingers provides a normal force that presses the corresponding mating interface against the header contact. To maintain the electrical connection between the header contact and the corresponding contact fingers, larger normal forces may be desirable. However, larger normal forces may increase adhesive wear and, consequently, the amount of mechanical wear sustained by the header contact. In addition to reducing the lifetime operability of the header contact and/or header connector, excessive wear may negatively affect electrical performance.
Accordingly, a need remains for electrical contacts and electrical connectors having the same in which the electrical contacts sustain less mechanical wear during mating operations.